Features - 2007

The 13th Conference of Parties (COP13) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) was held in Bali, Indonesia from December 3 to 14, 2007.
As one of the presentations, Dr. Masanobu Shimada, Research Field Leader of Japan Exploration Agency (JAXA) use PALSAR data from ALOS.

Since 2005, the Social Development Department of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has organized study sessions on how to use
information and communications technology (ICT). In these study sessions, lectures are held in JICA's Tokyo office and broadcast to JICA offices all over
the world.

The 1st Asia Pacific Water Forum was held in Oita Prefecture, Japan from December 3 to 4, 2007 focusing on three priority themes and attended by
around 300 heads of state and government representatives from 49 countries and regions around the world.

KAGUYA (SELENE) is a lunar explorer that was launched on September 14, 2007 from Japan. On October 18, 2007, it was injected into a lunar orbit
about 100 km above the surface of the Moon (Japan Standard Time). After successfully being injected into its observation orbit, the functions of
KAGUYA's 15 observation missions were verified as part of the initial checks that are to be performed until the middle of December 2007.

The state government started a project on August 27, 2007 as a two-year program implemented with the Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and
Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) that aims to provide a much better understanding of the risks of rising sea levels and stronger storm surges.

#035 Introduction of Malaysia Space Center and status of RazakSAT

The Malaysia Space Center, under the National Space Agency of Malaysia (ANGKASA), is a complex built on 400 acres of land in Banting,
about 40 km south-west of Kuala Lumpur. Currently, two facilities have been completed, the Mission Operation Centre (MOC) and the Optical Calibration
Lab.

#034 The 3rd APRSAF Water Rocket Event

As the joint educational activities for primary and secondary school students and teachers, the series of APRSAF-14 side events (APRSAF Poster
Contest and APRSAF Water Rocket Event) were successfully held, initiated by APRSAF Space Education Working Group.(India, 21-24 November.

This workshop organized by the Mekong River Commission(MRC), Asian Disaster Preparedness Center(ADPC) and Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische
Zusammenarbeit(GTZ) was held on from October 17 to 19 at Charoen Thani Princes Hotel , Khon Kaen, (Northwest of Thailand) with 120 participants
from 16 countries.

The IAC is an annual forum designed to offer space professionals from around the world the opportunity to meet and share information on current and
future projects. The 58th session of the IAC, with the theme "Touching Humanity: Space for Improving the Quality of Life," was hosted by the Indian
Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Astronautical Society of India (ASI) at Hyderabad, India from September 24 to 28. More than 2,000 space
professionals, journalists and students engaged in space activities from all over the world participated in this session.

#031 Workshop on Application of Satellite Rainfall Estimation in the Himalayan Region of the Hindu Kush, Nepal, October 1-5

This workshop was organized by the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) in Kathmandu, Nepal from October 1 to 5 to
improve the estimation of rainfall in the Himalayan region of the Hindu Kush, aiming to improve the forecasting of floods and monitoring of droughts using
advanced remote sensing tools.

"Killer electrons" are high-energy electrons in the Van Allen radiation belts and they can damage satellites in a geostationary orbit or cause them to
malfunction. Forecasting fluctuations in the volume of killer electrons is therefore scientifically very important. Dr. Yoshizumi Miyoshi, assistant professor
at Nagoya University, and Dr. Ryuho Kataoka, a special postdoctoral researcher at RIKEN, have developed the world's first space weather forecast which
forecasts the fluctuation in the volume of killer electrons using a probability method.

In May 2005, JAXA established a space education center in Japan to assist young people in their development as human beings. To reach out to a large number of children, the center works closely with school teachers by providing some of them with direct, customized support and others with indirect support. The center is gradually expanding its partnership with entities outside Japan, making the maximum use of the existing cooperation frameworks for space activities. The recent efforts of the center to promote water rockets and CanSat activities offer good examples of creating such synergies and supporting the objectives set by multiple mechanisms for cooperation in space education.

#028 Malaysia's first astronaut goes into space, October 10, Malaysia

Dr Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor Mustapha, Malaysia's first astronaut, lifted off on board a Russian Soyuz 15-S rocket with American astronaut Peggy Whitson,
the ISS7S new commander, and Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, at 9.21 pm Malaysia time on
October 10.He is the first Muslim to go into the space during the fasting month of Ramadan and he will observe the dawn-to-dusk fasting rules during
Ramadan, before Aidilfitri (the Malay term for the Muslim festival of Eid ul-Fitr).

This event was held at Millennium Hilton from September 18-20 in Bangkok, Thailand together with over 350 professionals from the satellite and
space-related industries and marked its prestige as the most premier satellite event in the Asia-Pacific region.